


Armour

by thesonder



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Canon Divergence - Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Crack, Fluff, Jokes, Nat and Tony are besties, Natasha Romanov & Tony Stark Friendship, Oneshot, Platonic Female/Male Relationships, Platonic Relationships, Protective Siblings, Requested, Sarcasm, Teasing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-18 04:07:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28736967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesonder/pseuds/thesonder
Summary: Tony is making Natasha a suit not too dissimilar to his own, and part of the process includes some painstaking measuring of Natasha's body dimensions. Sibling bickering and sarcasm ensues.This was a request, so I hope you enjoy!
Kudos: 42





	Armour

**Author's Note:**

> For Judit and Leah

“I still don’t know why you’re insisting we do this.” Natasha says as she spins around in circles in one of Tony’s desk chairs. They are in his workshop, and deconstructed pieces of metal and machine litter the numerous countertops. 

“Oh honey, please, I couldn’t watch you parade around in that leather one moment longer.” Tony explains as he hauls a black and red metal breastplate over to the soldering station. 

“Hey, back off my leather. It’s good.” Natasha defends, disembarking from the chair she had been spinning around in the past five minutes and approaching Tony while the latter set up. 

She stumbles a little, not anticipating how dizzy the spinning had made her, and Tony  
smirks. When she reaches him, she gives him a hard smack round the head as retribution. 

Chuckling, Tony grabs a tape measure from the desk and gestures to a raised platform in the centre of the room.

“Right then. Showtime. Get on the podium, we need to do some measurements.”

“Measurements? Oh boy, this is gonna be fun, isn’t it?” Natasha says, traipsing towards the podium and turning to face Tony once she has mounted it.

Tony gasps in mock outrage. “Dear me, is that a hint of sarcasm I hear?” Tony asks as he reaches Natasha on the podium. 

“Oh no, of course not.” she rolls her eyes, arms crossed. Tony gestures to them.

“I’m afraid if I’m measuring your shoulder span, that simply won’t do.” 

Natasha stares at him with a cool gaze for a moment, then reluctantly opens her arms and stretches them out either side of her. Tony smiles at her grumpy frown and extends the tape measure.

“Now, make sure you stay nice and still…”

There is a brief silence as Tony measures the width of Natasha’s shoulders to fingertips, elbows to shoulders and fingertips to wrists, for both arms. When he finishes and steps away, Natasha lets her arms fall to the sides with a relieved sigh, swinging them around in a windmill movement to loosen them up.

“Your arms are hurting after two minutes of holding them up? My my, Romanoff, we might have to get you back into the gym at this rate.” Tony tuts with his back to her, shaking his head as he scrawls down the measurements in a notebook on another nearby desk. 

“Shut up.” Natasha says, and she casts him the middle finger behind his back, lowering it before he can see as he turns back. Tony sees her deliberately innocent expression and furrows his brows in suspicion, but doesn’t say anything.

“Right! Legs!” he cries and runs back to Natasha on the podium. 

“Oh, joy.” she says sarcastically, as Tony crouches down to measure her leg span. 

First he measures the length between the top of her thigh to her toes while she stands up straight, for each leg.

“Right, I need to bend your leg.”

“What?” she says incredulously.

“Oh, please. You act like I’m asking you to dance the tango in front of the president. Just bend your knee, I need to check the distance between heel and the top of your leg when it’s bent.” Tony explains, gesturing towards her straight legs.

“Fine.” Natasha grumbles, and hesitantly lifts her left leg, bending it at an angle so it hovers an inch or two above the ground.

She wobbles a bit on one foot, and Tony looks up at her from his place on the floor. “I need you to stay still.”

“I _am_.” she protests.

“Nat, look at your leg, you’re moving.” Tony points out.

“ _I’m not moving!_ ” Natasha claims, but as she says this, she wobbles again.

Tony gestures frantically towards her leg. “Look at you! You’re moving!”

“ _Fine!_ ” Natasha hisses, and she grabs a hold of Tony’s hair that sits at waist level and uses it to steady herself. He yelps as she tugs at it, but Natasha does stop wobbling, and manages to finally stand still. “There. Is that better?”

“I hate you.” Tony mutters, but resumes measuring Nat’s bent leg span, and with a much greater amount of ease this time. 

Tony finishes measuring the legs and makes his way disgruntledly back to the table to record the values as Natasha smirks a little. But as she watches him write, her expression suddenly turns pensive. 

“Remind me why you’re making me this suit again. The _real_ reason.” she asks Tony as he finishes writing. 

He pauses for a second, not meeting her gaze. But she sees he is trying to find the words, and so stays silent as he gestures for her to raise her arms again. He extends the tape measure from under her arms towards her waist, and opens his mouth to speak.

“I wanted to… protect you. But I didn't know how. This…” Tony throws a quick hand backwards towards his crammed workshop, strewn with various pieces of metal. “Machines, engineering… it’s the only way I know how. I want you to be safe, to not get hurt. And making you a suit… it seemed like a good way to do that.”

He finishes, withdrawing with the tape measure and returning to the desk to record Nat’s torso measurements. 

Natasha evaluates this for a moment, not quite sure how to respond. In the end, she says, “Thank you.” 

She tries to put in how grateful she is in those two words, and she thinks it shows, because Tony nods briefly, looking at the floor, before looking back up quickly again as if renewed, “You won’t be thanking me in a minute, the last measurement left to do is bust size.” he grins cheekily.

“Alright-” Natasha rolls her eyes, snatching the tape measure from Tony’s hands as he chuckles, and she proceeds to complete the measurements herself. They finish recording all the measurements down, and Natasha leaves Tony in his workshop to start on fitting together the suit, skipping upstairs to go and play chess with Clint.

Six months later, Natasha waits in the landing bay of the Avengers Tower, staring in awe down at the gleaming red and black steel that coats her body, clad in the heavy machinery that hums and whirs smoothly as she moves. It’s incredible. And in it, she feels more powerful than ever. With a quiet smile that she shares only for herself, she runs to board the growling Quintjet and embark on another mission with her newfound family.


End file.
